Phoenix

There's only so much sustained drama I can handle, and Lucy has taken on the aspects of a Phoenix rising.  She's down.  She's up!  She's down.  At bedtime last evening, she was out grazing, and with a little guidance, tottered into her stall for the night.  The curtain will fall on Act III when it's over.

The forecasters have moved the storm back to tomorrow, but say when it comes it's going to be a doozy, with snow possible all the way down to Sacramento and a foot or more in my area.  I know now that I will lose the internet (and television) until the snow melts off the satellite dishes, and I'm not particularly looking forward to losing my contact with the outside world.  I'm just hoping we retain power (and water!).  It was so nice yesterday afternoon that I worked outside for hours, supervised closely by Pearl and accompanied by Bessie Anne, who chose to nap nearby.  Frank opted to stay indoors by the fire.  It's twenty-six degrees this morning and the fields are white with frost.  Today will be spent in preparations for what's coming.

I had to laugh at myself last night.  I wanted a snack, but the cupboard was bare of those packets of microwave popcorn.  Oh well, or, as my friend Linda says, sigh.  After years of using the microwave stuff, I'd absolutely forgotten how we used to make popcorn!  I actually had jars of honest-to-god popcorn left over from long, long ago.  I had inherited the pot that my mother had used to make popcorn and I'd used it until the handles fell off.  Jiffy Pop, with those aluminum foil expandable covers, was the newest rage back in the day, then came air poppers, and finally microwave packets.  How quickly we forget.  I took a step back in time, pulled out a pan and hoping the old corn would do it's thing, made popcorn on the stove.  How satisfying!